Characteristic of Mário Macilau’s photographic process, Things Fall Apart (2021) is the result of a long-term project engaging specific communities – in this case, locals in the north of Mozambique. The artist’s full-colour depictions of individuals, the ephemera of their lives, labour and relationships, are at once sensitive and troubling: stark, and subtle. Things Fall Apart shares themes with Chinua Achebe’s 1958 novel of the same name, and Macilau’s close-ups call on those parts to summon the story of their whole.  

 Major exhibitions include: Faith Rituals and the Sea, Guns and Rain, Johannesburg (2019); The Pavilion of the Holy Sea at the 56th Venice Biennale (2015) and Making Africa: A Continent of Contemporary Design, Vitra Design Museum, Guggenheim Bilbao and other museums (2015 onwards).